Tag Archives: pop culture

Wooof just gave me his Hello Kitty USB stick and said: “Latest ads all scanned boss, post ’em up, I’m off to Italy for the weekend.” “What kind of ads are they?” I asked the cat. “Oh, a bit of this, a bit of that. Everything but the kitchen sink really.” “And how am I supposed to put a theme to them?” I said. “There are categories and tags and witty comments to consider. We can’t all go swanning off to Italy you know.” “How should I know,” replied the cat, already packing his case and searching for his Aviators. “You’re the editor. Just call the post ‘Everything But The Kitchen Sink’, or something.” “Righto,” I said. “Ha, be funny if there really was a kitchen sink ad on your USB stick.” The cat looked at me and sighed. “That would be just ridiculous. Right, I’m off. Plane to catch. Don’t work too hard this weekend. Miow and ciao baby!”

Bye Wooof.

Door slams.

Cue one inserted Hello Kitty USB stick into the TVTA hard drive, and I present, a mixed bag of retro adverts, everything but the kitchen sink…

Dino-Riders was a VHS and TV series animated show that ran between 1987 and 1988 with an additional special feature in 1990. The storyline concentrated on the war between the time-travelling Valorian and Rulon factions, and their relationship with and employment of prehistoric dinosaurs as weapons/vehicles.

A toyline was created in the US by Tyco featuring both the humanoid and dinosaur characters. The dinosaurs were so highly regarded for their detailed sculpts and colour that the famous Smithsonian Institution approached Tyco to reproduce adapted versions for their “Dinosaur and other Prehistoric Reptile Collection”. The following two adverts are from France and Italy.

* The TVTA time machine Mk II does not currently work. The last time it did was in June 1994 when TVTA successfully made a return trip to 12th century Venus. Feel free to jiggle around with a screwdriver and duct tape and you may get it working again!

I was wondering how to present these ten modern paperworks I recently scanned – and I thought let’s see if I can twin them up with vintage counterparts. A sort of new versus old. Shiny versus retro. It took me a while to go through my archives looking for suitable matchups – especially anything vintage I might have with Spider-woman on it! Ultimately it was a fun exercise involving adverts and comic covers. Here are the results… (click pics to go bigger)

The Weetabix as seen in British comic book advertising. Thirteen adverts dated between 1982 – 1985.

‘The Weetabix’, often referred to as ‘The Weetabix Gang’, were five comic characters based on British skinheads, and were created for a highly successful advertising campaign for breakfast cereal Weetabix. It’s hard to believe that these biscuit-shaped, brace-wearing characters – Dunc, Bixie, Bryan, Brains and Crunch – managed to capture the hearts, and breakfast bowls, of the British public in the huge way that it did, considering the negative attitudes that were often levelled at skinhead culture.

‘The Weetabix’ featured throughout almost the entire 1980s in TV and comic book adverts. Some of the promotions tied in with well-known crazes of the decade such as video games, BMX and breakdancing, and even captured the spirit of the white tee-shirt and slogan fad, which was popular with fans of bands such as Frankie Goes To Hollywood and Wham!.

Ultimately ‘The Weetabix’ became a brand unto themselves, offering a vast range of merchandise via ‘The Weetabix Club’. Items ranged from clothing and patches to books and badges, lunch boxes, school and sports bags, stationery, an AM radio, an alarm clock, a Corgi licensed die cast truck, and many other items featuring the five characters and their catchphrases.

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TVTA has now published 1,971 vintage adverts! That’s enough adverts to encircle the planet three times, hot enough to fry an egg, deep enough to fill six olympic swimming pools, and faster than a cheetah driving a Formula One car!!